The September 14 drone strikes on Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq refinery and Khurais oil field set off a flurry of writing about its impact on the global oil market. After all, Khurais is the kingdom’s second-largest oil field with a capacity to pump around 1.45 million barrels a day (mbd) and Abqaiq is the world’s largest refinery processing around 4.9 mbd. The attack was believed to have affected 5.7 mbd or around five per cent of the global oil supplies leading to an immediate spike of 20 per cent in the international crude prices. 1 However, with Aramco assuring early restoration of supplies, the prices subsequently came down though not to the earlier levels. Meanwhile, conflicting media reports that the prices will not be affected due to the comfortable supply situation as well as the slow pace of the global economy on the one hand, and that the prices have […]